During the past several years the emphasis of ecologists in keeping a clean environment coupled with the ever increasing use of disposable paper products has accented the always present, but sometimes not as troublesome, task of emptying waste cans, litter boxes and the like. For example, in the fast food industry, an average fast food store typically employs several waste cans scattered throughout the restaurant where residents may deposit their own litter upon completion of their meal. Each of such waste cans or baskets generally takes the form of a housing having an access opening which is usually covered by some type of swinging door or cover. Within the generally, but not necessarily a removable can normally, but not necessarily, having a thin film plastic liner removably deposited therein. Periodically throughout the day each of such waste cans is removed from the housing, the plastic bag removed, tied off at the top, and carried out to a collection point in the rear of the building.
It is somewhat surprising that tests have shown that such an establishment may use fifty to sixty of such plastic liners a day, while an estimated attendant two to four man-hours of employee time per day (depending on the season) are required to make so many emptyings. Often such waste cans become full and overflowing at peak times which makes it extremely inconvenient for an employee to be relieved from his normal duties to empty waste cans. However, if such is not done, the areas in which the waste cans are located become extremely unsightly with an attendant ill effect on the normally clean atmosphere of the restaurant.
Further, two or three times a day a relatively expensive serving tray will erroneously, either inadvertently or deliberately be dropped into a waste can or basket in such types of establishment. When the plastic liner is merely tied off and deposited in the collection container outside, the fact that a serving tray is in the bag rarely becomes known to the employee. The large volume to weight ratio of the bags carries over to the outside containers so that they fill more rapidly and have to be emptied more often with additional cost disadvantages. The same problems to a greater or lesser extent exist in other businesses, industries, institutions and public places, even in the home.
While compacting of the trash becomes important there are only two types of approaches to trash compacting heretofore known. One is the electro-mechanical compactor, which is a container having a mechanically powered ram that mashes and grinds up trash as it is deposited therein. The other is a waste receptacle of the type illustrated and described in U.S. Pat. No. 3,779,157 in which a compacting ram is permanently mounted for slidable operation in the cover of the waste receptacle. Both of these approaches are relatively expensive as far as initial cost is concerned.